Types of accommodation

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At the end of 2025, 142,581 asylum applicants and beneficiaries of international protection were accommodated in the reception system, slightly more than in 2024 (139,141), but significantly more than in 2022 (107,677) and 2021 (78,644).^[1] Out of the total number, 41,475 asylum applicants and beneficiaries of international protection were hosted SAI centres.^[2] According to data shared by MOI following a FOIA request, at the end of 2025, 3,343 were in governmental centres, 101,106 in CAS and 3,652 in hotspots. No data was available about the number of people accommodated in CASP (provisional CAS).

Thus, at the end of 2025, almost 7 out of 10 asylum applicants were still accommodated in extraordinary centres.

Source: Ministry of Interior, data obtained through a FOIA access.

Data shows that, during these years, the emergency system continues to grow at the expense of an ordinary management system. In 2026, the Ministry of Interior, responding to the FOIA data request by ASGI, did not communicate the number of facilities.

Following the 2023 reform, the reception system is comprised of first governmental centres, temporary centres (CAS), provisional centres (CASP new from the 2023 reform), and SAI centres.

Decree Law 124/2023, converted into L. 162/2023, entrusted the Ministry of Defence with the creation of reception centres, hotspots and CPRs.^[4] For the realisation of such facilities, the law also provides that the Ministry of Defence is authorised to make use of the “highest urgency procedures and civil protection procedures” (pursuant to art. 140 of Legislative Decree 31 March 2023, no. 36). At the same time, the law provides that, by Decree of the President of the Council of Ministers, upon proposal of the Ministers of the Interior and Defence, in agreement with the Minister of Economy and Finance, the extraordinary plan for the identification of the areas interested in the creation of a suitable number of hotspots, CPR, government centres and CAS, also through the valorisation of existing properties, will be approved.^[5]

As underlined by a study, these new provisions have significant weight, as:

facilities for migrants, without distinction, from those aimed at reception to those dedicated to detention and deprivation of liberty, will be implemented by adopting “highly urgent procedures”, thus crystallising the systemic emergency approach. Centres and structures will be built on the basis of a plan adopted by the Council of Ministers based on the indications provided by the Minister of the Interior and the Minister of Defence, in contrast with what it is provided for by the Reception Decree in terms of planning and consultation, and forgetting that «the reception system for applicants for international protection is based on fairness collaboration between the different levels of government involved” (art. 8 Legislative Decree no. 142/2015).^[6]

From this point of view, it is worrying that, in response to the FOIA request for access to data relating to reception measures made by ASGI, the Ministry of the Interior has announced that it does not possess the data relating to the CASPs as they are not subject to central collection.^[7]

First aid and identification: CPSA / Hotspots

The Reception Decree states that for ‘rescue, first aid and identification needs’, people can be placed in so called crisis points set up in the principal places of disembarkation, and in governmental centres.^[8] These are First Aid and Reception Centres (CPSA),^[9] created in 2006 for the purposes of first aid and identification before persons are transferred to other centres, and now formally operate as Hotspots.^[10] According to the SOPs, persons should stay in these centres “for the shortest possible time”, but in practice are accommodated there for days or weeks. By the end of 2025, 13 hotspots were operating in the south of Italy: Apulia (1), Sicily (8) and Calabria (4).

The table shared by the MOI responding to a FOIA request made by ASGI in early 2026, gives more details:

 Decree-Law 20/2023 provided that, until 31 December 2025, the Lampedusa hotspot could be managed by the Italian Red Cross, in derogation from the rules on tendering procedures.^[11] Through DL 146/2025,^[12] the management was prolonged until 31 December 2027. This provision became necessary following the continuous mismanagement issues registered in the facility (see Conditions in hotspots), in order to ensure the functionality of a structure considered fundamental to the Italian system. The same 2023 Decree also allowed Government to activate new hotspot facilities throughout the national territory, with the same functions of identification, selection and administrative detention, again in derogation from the rules relating to tender procedures.^[13] The identification of suitable locations to host new hotspots and their activation has been entrusted to the Extraordinary Commissioner appointed by the Government as part of the declaration of the state of emergency.^[14]

Governmental first reception centres

The Reception Decree provides that the governmental first reception centres are managed by public local entities, consortia of municipalities and other public or private bodies, specialised in the assistance of asylum applicants, selected through public tender.^[15]

Responding to the FOIA request made by ASGI, the Ministry of Interior reported that, as of 31 December 2025, 8 first reception centres existed in the following regions in Italy:

Source: MoI.

The Hub centre located in Bologna, Mattei, is now classified as CAS. Other governmental centres working as first accommodation facilities but not classified as first governmental centres by MoI are the one of Fernetti, in Trieste, called Casa Malala, and the one in Pordenone, Caserma Monti, both in Friuli Venezia Giulia.^[16]

Temporary facilities: CAS

In case of temporary unavailability of places in the first reception centres, the Reception Decree provides for the use of Emergency Reception Centres (centri di accoglienza straordinaria, CAS). The CAS system, originally designed as a temporary measure to prepare for transfer to second-line reception, expanded in recent years to the point of being entrenched in the ordinary system. The Reception Decree adopted in August 2015 missed the opportunity to actually change the system and simply renamed these centres from “emergency centres” to “temporary facilities” (strutture temporanee).

The CAS are identified and activated by the Prefectures, in cooperation with the Ministry of Interior. Following Decree Law 113/2018, CAS facilities can be activated only after obtaining the opinion of the local authority on whose territory the structures will be set up.^[17] The law does not condition activation upon obtaining a favourable opinion, it only says that an opinion should be requested. Activation is reserved for emergency cases of substantial arrivals, but applies in practice to all situations in which, as it is currently the case, capacity in ordinary centres is not sufficient to meet the reception demand.

The term CAS is a formal classification related to the temporary function of the reception facility but does not in itself define its nature. The forms that a CAS facility can take are in fact extremely varied, going from small apartments that managing bodies rent from private citizens to collective centres organised within entire buildings, from camps organised with containers and tents to former army barracks. The tender specifications scheme, in fact, provides for the possibility of setting up CAS in “single housing units”, in collective centres with less than 50 places, centres with a capacity between 50 and 300 places, or collective centres with more than 300 places.^[18]

Following the reform of the accommodation system made by Decree Law 20/2023, the CAS are specifically designed for the first accommodation phase and no longer conceived as temporary solutions for the time “strictly necessary” until the transfer of asylum applicants to the SAI system.^[19] The services guaranteed are the same as in the first reception centres (see Forms and Levels of Material Reception Conditions).^[20]

By the end of 2025, there were 101,106 persons hosted in CAS in Italy.^[21] The table below shows their distribution across Italy. The fact that most available places are currently in CAS illustrates a reception policy based on leaving asylum applicants in emergency accommodation during the entire asylum procedure.

As highlighted above (see Forms and Levels of Material Reception Conditions), following the 2018 MoI tender specification schemes, most small CAS facilities were forced to close, leaving on the accommodation scene large centres managed by for-profit organisations or big social cooperatives.

Provisional centres (CASP)

1. 50/2023 introduced a new type of reception facility: provisional centres, intended to accommodate asylum applicants for the time strictly necessary to identify an available place in a governmental centre or in CAS. Reception in these facilities is arranged by the Prefect and is limited to the provision of basic services, namely food, accommodation, clothing, health care and linguistic-cultural mediation.^[22] The regulatory provision^[23] is included within the law governing temporary centres (CAS) even though these centres are conceived as structures to be used only for the “strictly necessary time” to identify available places in the government centres or in CAS facilities. The tender specifications for CASPs do not even provide for mandatory presence of social workers, but only of day/night operators and cultural mediators. The scheme merely provides for an almost doubled number of hours for linguistic mediation:

The provision presents both positive aspects and some that can be critised. On the one hand, it could offer greater protection pending the identification of suitable reception places, as it makes it easier to find structures and bodies capable of offering this type of service; on the other hand, it could lead to asylum applicants being hosted in centres providing lower standards in terms of reception conditions for indefinite periods of time.

The few, official, experiences of CASP in Italy so far are not reassuring.^[24] As emerges from a recent investigation, these are, “in most cases, encampments consisting of tents or containers, or even rows of cots in former disused barracks, hamlets of airports or gyms” which mainly “are located several kilometres from inhabited centres, in the countryside and in industrial areas. (..) places of promiscuity, where women, men, families, unaccompanied minors live together”.^[25]

Responding to ASGI’s FOIA request, in 202§ the MoI stated that data on CASPs are not available, as they are not collected by the MoI. The same problem was highlighted in 2025 by Openpolis and Actionaid in their latest report on the accommodation system in Italy.  However, thanks to cooperation with the organisation CIAC onlus, it was able to determine that 4 temporary structures were activated during 2023. 3 of these were included as CAS for adult asylum seekers in the data released by the MoI: 2 temporary centres in the municipality of Parma (“Martorano” with a capacity of 100 places and one with a capacity of 8 places) and one in the municipality of Varano de’ Melegari, with a capacity of 24 places.^[26]

Second reception – SAI system

The SAI system (Reception and Integration System, Sistema di Accoglienza e Integrazione) is dedicated mainly to beneficiaries of international protection and unaccompanied minors.^[27] SAI projects can also accommodate: victims of trafficking; domestic violence and serious exploitation; persons issued a residence permit for medical treatment, or natural calamity in the country of origin, or for acts of particular civic value,^[28] holders of special protection, holders of a permit for special cases (former humanitarian protection),^[29] and former unaccompanied minors, who obtained a prosecution of assistance.^[30] Women are also automatically included among vulnerable asylum applicants, with priority given to pregnant women.^[31] Holders of special protection, who were denied international protection on the basis of the exclusion clauses, are excluded from the SAI network.

Law 50/2023, which converted Decree Law 20/2023, once again (as in 2018) excluded asylum applicants from the possibility to access the SAI system. Access to the SAI is now only possible for asylum applicants identified as vulnerable and to those who have legally entered Italy through complementary pathways (Government-led resettlements or private sponsored humanitarian admission programs).

On 31 January 2026, the SAI network comprised 862 projects, a decrease from the 879 existing in 2024 for a total of 41,475 places financed (a, increase from the 38,696 places in 2024 and 37,920 of 2023). This includes 34,059 places for ordinary beneficiaries, 6,655 places for unaccompanied minors and 761 places for people living with mental health conditions or physical disability. However, historically, the number of SAI places funded by the government and the number of active and available SAI places differ by several thousands, due to bureaucratic delays as well as organisational and logistical issues. As of January 2026, out of the total places financed, 1,978 were not occupied.^[32]

The activation of SAI reception projects depends on funding provided directly by the Ministry of the Interior (and not by the Prefectures, as for CAS and first reception centres) to the local authority. The latter must voluntarily apply to host a reception project in its territory and submit a detailed project to the Ministry, asking for funding. The application is evaluated by a commission and, if deemed appropriate, the local project is financed for a period usually equal to 3 years. At the end of the period financed, the municipality holder of the project can ask the Ministry for a new three-year funding.^[33]

Although SAI projects, are generally more stable than CAS, as they benefit from on multi-year funding that promotes service quality, they remain inherently fragile because their establishement and continuation depend entirely on the voluntary participation of local administrations.^[34] This significantly limits SAI’s nationwide coverage, and hinders availability of places and immediate access to the system, even for the limited number of asylum applicants who would be entitled to it. Even though the SAI system has been slowly but constantly expanded throughout the country in the 20 years since it was set up,^[35] the total amount of available places is still largely inadequate to meet the existing needs.

Data shows that, in 2025, SAI remained concentrated in Southern Italy and, worryingly, 10 out of 21 regions do not have places for vulnerable asylum applicants or beneficiaries of international protection.^[36] This has led, including in 2025, to situations in which vulnerable asylum seekers or beneficiaries of international protection were denied to entry in SAI and notified of the cessation of their accommodation measure in CAS after being granted international protection.

On 22 June 2024, the administrative court of Trieste (Friuli Venezia Giulia) suspended a decision to terminate reception concerning a refugee with mental health problems for whom an adequate SAI project could not be found, considering it necessary, in any case, ‘to give priority to the to the protection of the applicant’s person, exposed to serious and irreparable damage in the event of interruption of the necessary support in reception’.^[37]

On 6 February 2025, the administrative court of Naples (Campania) ordered the Ministry of Interior to immediately arrange for the applicant to be placed in a structure without delay, “other” than the one (CAS) in which he was currently hosted, adapted to his peculiar conditions of physical and mental discomfort.^[38]

On 20 May 2025, the administrative court of Rome (Lazio) ordered the SAI to comply with an earlier ruling concerning access to SAI for an extremely vulnerable refugee. The same court had previously ordered, in proceedings against the Servizio Centrale’s silence, that the refugee be admitted to the SAI. Nearly two months later, in November, the Servizio Centrale informed their lawyer by email that it was in the “objective impossibility” to place the client in reception. In the new judgment, the Court ordered compliance with its previous decision within 30 days and appointed a commissario ad acta in case of further inaction.^[39]

Private accommodation with families and churches

In addition to the abovementioned reception centres, there is also a network of private accommodation facilities which are not part of the national public reception system, provided for example by Catholic or voluntary associations, which support multiple asylum applicants and refugees.

It is very difficult to ascertain the number of available places in these forms of reception. These structures are relevant especially in emergency cases or as integration pathways, following or in lieu of accommodation in S.A.I.

Other projects financed by municipalities or AMIF funds and directed at accommodating families and unaccompanied minors have been initiated. For example:

• In Bologna, the VESTA project, conceived and developed by the Camelot Social Cooperative is operational. The project, designed mainly for beneficiaries of international and special protection who reach the age of majority, provides a contribution towards the costs to the host family.^[40]
• The OHANA project, financed by AMIF fund, is developing accommodation for families of unaccompanied minors in the cities of Turin, Milan, Pavia, Venice, Verona Padova, Pordenone, Rome, Bari, Catania and Palermo.^[41]
• The NGO Refugees Welcome Italia promotes numerous initiatives of “welcome in the family” for protection holders who have had to abandon the public reception system, in particular to those who have not found a place in the SAI or have had to leave before the actual conclusion of their path of social inclusion. Refugees Welcome has developed over the years a significant network on the Italian territory, putting itself in relation both with the authorities of the reception centres and with numerous municipal administrations.^[42]

^[1]          MOI Cruscotto statistico giornaliero, available here.

^[2]          See source in Italian here.

^[3]          This total number is different from the one indicated in the table published by Moi and it is calculated basing on the answer given by MOI to the FOIA request for data. It does not contain people accommodated in CASP

^[4]          Article 21 (1) Decree Law 124/2023 converted into L. 162/2023.

^[5]          Article 21 (2) Decree Law 124/2023 converted into L. 162/2023

^[6]          M. Giovannetti, Il prisma dell’accoglienza: la disciplina del sistema alla luce della legge n. 50/2023, in Questione Giustizia, available in Italian at: https://acesse.dev/zt1rw.

^[7]          MoI response to the FOIA request sent by ASGI to the Ministry of Interior in February 2025.

^[8]          Article 8(2) Reception Decree as amended by DL 20/2023 converted into L. 50/2023, and Article 10 ter TUI.

^[9]          L 563/1995.

^[10]         Article 10-ter TUI, inserted by Article 17 Decree Law 13/2017 and L 46/2017.

^[11]         Article 5-bis (2) Decree Law 20/2023 converted with modifications into Law 50/2023.

[12]         Article 10, DL 146/2025, converted into L.179/2025.

^[13]         Article 5-bis (3) Decree Law 20/2023 converted with modifications into Law 50/2023.

^[14]         Article 2 (1a) Decree of the Chief of the Department of Civil Protection 984/2023.

^[15]         Article 9(2) Reception Decree.

^[16]         See MoI, available at: https://bit.ly/3y4dbFm.

^[17]         Article 11 (2) Reception Decree, as amended by Article 12 Decree Law 113/2018 and L 132/2018. Prior to the reform, the law provided that the local authorities should only be notified and issue a non-binding opinion.

^[18]         See new Tender Specification Schemes, Ministerial Decree 4 March 2024. Schemes and Decree available at: bit.ly/3JU5KaZ.

^[19]         Article 11 (3) Reception Decree, as amended by Decree Law 20/2023.

^[20]         Articles 10 (1) and 1 1(2) Reception Decree.

^[21]         MoI response to the FOIA request made by ASGI.

^[22]         Article 11 (2 bis) Reception Decree introduced by L 50/2023.

^[23]         Article 11 ( 2 bis) Reception Decree

^[24]         Michele Rossi, “Cornocchio e Martorano (Parma). Two fields lived up close”, in RiVolti ai Balcani, Chiusi Dentro, Altreconomia, Milan, 2024.

^[25]         Cf. Antonia Ferri, Irpi Media, “The Casp tell us where the reception of migrants in Italy is going”, 12 July 2024, available in Italian here.

[26]         Actionaid and Openpolis report, Accoglienza al collasso, Centri d’Italia 2024, published in March 2025, available here.

^[27]         According to Article 1-sexies DL 416/1989, as amended by DL 130/2020, local authorities responsible for the SAI projects “can” host in such projects also asylum seekers and beneficiaries of special protection or other protection titles.

^[28]         Article 1 sexies (1) DL 416/1989, as amended by DL 130/2020, citing Articles 18, 18-bis, 19(2)(d-bis), 20, 22(12-quater) and 42-bis TUI. The statuses in Articles 20 and 42-bis had been inserted by Decree Law 113/2018.

^[29]         Ibid, mentioning Articles 1 (9) DL 113/2018 (special cases); Article 19, (1, 1.1) TUI, amended by DL 130/2020.

^[30]         Article 1 sexies (1 bis) DL 416/1989, introduced by DL 130/2020. In some CAS, according to the law unaccompanied minors becoming adults can benefit from further assistance (accommodation and help) up to 21 years. It is called “prosieguo amministrativo”, administrative continuation.

^[31]         Article 17 (1) LD 142/2015.

^[32]         See SAI general data, 31 December 2024, available here.

^[33]         The funding application and assessment mechanism for the project is governed by the Ministerial Decree 18 November 2019.

^[34]         For a recent analysis of the impact of political preferences on the political willingness to open reception facilities, see the significant contribution from Gamalerio and Negri, Not welcome anymore: the effect of electoral incentives on the reception of refugees, in Journal of Economic Geography, available at: https://doi.org/10.1093/jeg/lbad002.

^[35]         See Rapporto Annuale SAI 2021, available at: https://bit.ly/3Z9qQbt.

^[36]         See SAI general data, 31 December 2024, available here.

^[37]         Administrative Court of Trieste, interim decision no. 46/2024, published on 22 June 2024.

^[38]         Administrative Court of Naples (Campania), decision no. 270/2025, published on 6 February 2025.

[39]         Administrative court of Rome (Lazio), decision no.9655/2025, published on 20 May 2025.

^[40]         Bologna, Camelot presenta Vesta, per ospitare rifugiati in famiglia, available at: https://bit.ly/3y9ALDf.

^[41]         Ohana project, see: https://bit.ly/3jD0v28.

^[42]         Source Refugees Welcome Italia, Cosa facciamo, available at: https://bit.ly/42pAXdA.